Namdo Hanjeongsik

Hanjeongsik is the full-course Korean table, and the Jeolla version, namdo hanjeongsik, is the one Koreans travel for. The historical reason is agricultural: the Jeolla plains are the most productive rice and vegetable ground in the country and the coast supplies fish and shellfish, so this was where a household could put out a table that others could not. The form is that everything arrives at once - twenty to forty dishes covering the table, sometimes on a second tier - built around rice and a soup, with grilled and braised fish, meat, jeon pancakes, fermented vegetables, seasoned greens, raw marinated crab or fish depending on the house, and a large number of banchan. Prices are per person with a two-person minimum and the range is wide. It is a lot of food, and the intended approach is small tastes across the whole table rather than finishing anything.

What you actually see

• The full table - twenty to forty dishes arriving together.
• The regional produce - the Jeolla plains and coast on one surface.
• The banchan range - seasoned greens and ferments in quantity.
• The per-person sets - graded, with a two-person minimum.

When to go

Any time, though lunch sets are often cheaper than dinner. Book ahead at the well-known houses in Gwangju and Mokpo, especially at weekends.

Honest expectations

It is expensive at the upper grades and genuinely too much food. Some dishes - raw marinated crab, fermented skate in some houses - are strongly flavoured and not to everyone's taste. Two-person minimum.

Nearby

Gwangju, Mokpo, Naju and Suncheon are the usual bases for it.